


Following Pfaster

by Sarie_Fairy



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Angst, Cunnilingus, F/M, First Time, MSR, Oral Sex, Post-Episode: s07e07 Orison, Resolved Sexual Tension, Sex, Smut, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-05
Updated: 2019-09-20
Packaged: 2020-10-06 09:02:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20504381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sarie_Fairy/pseuds/Sarie_Fairy
Summary: This picks up after Episode 7, Season 7 of the X-Files, Orison.Packed a bag, left the dead man, patched up and examined, statements at the local police station.... It's very late now, and she's not allowed back home, so Mulder takes her to a hotel....Disclaimer: I do not own the X-Files or the characters and make no profit from writing about them.





	1. Chapter 1

No, no violation. Not in that bodily region anyway. That is except for the one just performed by a perfect stranger with cold latex fingers and sympathetic eyes. The perverse irony that examination and evidence gathering, for proof of sexual violation necessarily simulated the act itself, was not lost on Scully. More uncomfortable this time, though; her damaged back flat against the hard hospital examination table. Damaged from the mirror, from fighting back. From fighting back with the strength and bile inducing anger at men who use their unearned, biological, physical power to inflict violence on women. Fighting back for those who fell before her. 

Answering routine questions, asked by the first attending officer, Scully was clear, unemotional and detailed, but could only affirm that there hadn’t been any _ known _sexual assault. She was pretty sure, for an unknown amount of time though, she’d been unconscious, so… As she pulled her underwear back on, she acknowledged that as uncomfortable and undignified as the procedure had been, it had been worth it to know for sure. 

She shuffled back into the waiting room, saw Mulder, and allowed a long held-in breath to leave her body. 

Catching her gaze, Mulder raised his eyebrows in question, and his forehead creased in compassion and preparation for an answer he didn’t want to hear. Her hair was dishevelled, and she was wearing track pants, an oversized sweater, sneakers and a split lip. So vastly different to her usual ‘uniform’; she looked disarmed. 

“He didn’t,” she said simply, shaking her head. Then she flicked a smile to the corners of her mouth, but it disappeared just as fast. 

Mulder made the noise that originated the word ‘phew’. Raised an arm, Scully obliged, moving over and tucking herself under it. They made their way out to the parking lot, joined together. 

Next stop - the police station. They had time in the car drive over to get their stories straight. Understanding officers, who treated them as their own, took their statements. _ All law enforcers here, we don’t discriminate. _

No charges. Self-defence. Free to go. _ Thank you, Mulder. _

After the police station, Mulder drove them to a hotel. He had offered her his place to stay, and even though he often slept on the couch, she didn’t want to kick him out of his bed. The detective had informed Scully that it could be the best part of a week before she could get back into her apartment. Evidence gathering, clean up. Her apartment a crime scene, for not the first time. Not the only time someone had been shot and killed in her apartment. The first bullet meant for her, this time, she fired. _ Was there some symbolism there? _ She didn’t know. What she did know for certain was that she didn’t feel bad about it, about killing him. She felt powerful. And she had just gotten away with murder. _ Thanks again, Mulder. _The world was better off without him in it, and she was brazenly at peace with being judge, jury and executioner.

Unlocking the door to the room, Mulder pushed it open, let her walk in under his arm and then flicked on the light. There were two double beds. Scully wondered if Skinner organised that on purpose, assumed Mulder would stay. He would; she wanted him to. He needed to. Scully knew Mulder blamed himself, felt accountable. She _ had _ told him the whole case that there was a puzzling connection to her; that song, “Scout”. But he dismissed it. Quite frankly, notwithstanding a song or Sunday school teacher’s pet names, it was such a glaring oversight on both their behalves, Skinner’s too, leaving Scully alone, and unprotected while Pfaster was still at large. She was the one that got away. It was practically textbook.

Mulder put her bag down on a table. He didn’t have one. Finding daily grooming and clothes selection perfunctory he was happy to exist, for the short term, with the clothes on his back and the room’s complimentary toothbrush. Looking around, rubbing a hand down one side of his face, he wondered what the procedure for this situation was. What words he could say, or actions he could take, to soothe her? He thought about running her a bath and started in the direction of the bathroom, firstly to see if there was one. But he stopped short – _ not a fucking bath, Mulder _. Only hours earlier, someone else had run her a bath that she thankfully didn’t take. 

His attention landed on her; she was pacing, agitated. “Scully? Can I get you anything?”

“Hmm? Um, no…” She trailed off, pacing again. Restless. 

There was an energy coursing through her. It was adrenalin, she knew it physiologically, but the feelings that accompanied the fight-or-flight hormone were not altogether congruent with what she’d just been through. She felt wild. Scully knew she didn’t have to pull that trigger. She _ wanted _ to do it. It was a choice, not a reaction. The sensation, whatever it was, didn’t match anything she’d previously experienced after firing her weapon in the line of duty. She felt dominant. Potent. Scully had a vague self-awareness that those verbs, for her, were often accompanied by _ aroused _. Was that the unidentified state of Dana Scully?

“Are you okay, Scully? You seem like a -- caged animal…” Mulder ventured.

She stopped moving and breathed in. “Funny you should say that Mulder ...” The heels of her hands covered her eyes as she put pressure on her eye sockets. She took a few breaths like that before dropping her hands and continuing, “... that’s kind of how I feel right now.” She rubbed her hands up and down her arms in place of moving her feet across the room.

“Can I help you with anything?”

Scully turned to him, breathing hard, pupils dilated. She knew what she needed, from _ someone _.

What Mulder didn’t know was that Scully occasionally used sex to relinquish tension. She had kept in touch with an old ex-lover, Tom, a dickhead that she went through the academy with. When she had an itch, and the time, it was easy to get him to scratch it. There was no concern for what he thought of her because she didn’t care for his opinion. Sometimes, she would be so frustrated and wound up from her intense job, from the absence of a normal life, from fights with Mulder (that left her feeling impotent), she’d take it out on Tom. Or take it out on herself, with Tom. Sometimes it was just sexual frustration, Mulder at the centre of that too.

They didn’t talk much, she and Tom. She’d just send him a text (before they both had cell phones, she’d page him). If he were in town, she’d head to his place. Never hers. Sometimes a hotel room - he paid. Most of the time, she was there less than 30 minutes. It was a one-way exchange. Well, that’s not entirely true, Tom got something out of it. Dana was the best sex of his life; it was just that she called the shots. He asked once, to turn their ‘thing’ into a more permanent arrangement, a regular gig; she didn’t contact him for six months. He never asked again.

When she was ill, dying, she didn’t tell Tom, just didn’t see him during that time. Or for a while after. Then things with Mulder became strange and muddy. She felt him become distant and abrasive, or perhaps that described her behaviour towards him. She honestly didn’t know when it came to Mulder and her - who was perpetrating, who was reacting. 

Scully was sure, on and off, that Tom had had girlfriends. She never asked, he never said; not her problem. They always used protection, she insisted on it. She hadn’t let him kiss her on the mouth in a long while. The last several times, she didn’t want to look at him; he’d enter her from behind and had to keep his hands on her hips. 

Scully understood that she could always masturbate (and often that was enough), but there was something about the control, it wasn’t the same without that element, and it factored into her release. 

“I might need to go out, Mulder.”

“What are you talking about? What do you need? I can get it.” Confusion and concern, on his brow.

“I just have to … let off some steam.” She was fidgeting on the spot now; hands playing with one another. “I feel like I might explode. Like I need to punch the wall…” She began to pace again.

“What do you normally do? Go for a run?” He waited for her to respond. She didn’t. “It’s the middle of the night Scully, and you’re injured.” He reminded her.

“No… Mulder, I … I just ...”

Breathing steadily in and out, Scully had her forehead in the vice of her thumb and fingers, rubbing. Why did it feel like she was about to confess to infidelity? The thought angered her; she wasn’t cheating on him, on Mulder. He was her partner, a colleague. They were also friends, and friends could share this type of information about themselves. She was a grown woman. A consenting adult, with another consenting adult. So, she just said it, “I have sex.”

“What?”

“When I get cagey like this, I have … _ need _sex.” She licked her lips and tucked her chin, looked at him through the filter of her eyelashes as if that would somehow defuse his reaction.

“With whom?” He blurted. He had a physical reaction too, a seemingly involuntary shake of his head like he’d just been comically slapped with a large, cold, fish.

“Does it matter?” Scully replied slightly indignantly, responding to his tone. 

“Yes! Um, no. No.” He looked confused, then hurt. Then hurt and confused.

“I’m just going to send him a message.”

“Who?”

She let out a noise of exasperation. And a look like, _ didn’t I just tell you? _She went to her bag, mind made up, found her phone.

“Scully, no.” He was scrambling. “I don’t want you leaving here.” He took a step toward her, his hand coming out instinctively. He paused, mid whatever he intended that gesture to be.

She caught sight of his hand. Was breathing heavily. She licked her lips, spoke with calm authority. “What are you going to do Mulder, stop me?” He looked at her, deer in headlights. She straightened herself up, looked him square in the eyes, arched an eyebrow and said, “or are you going to fuck me?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading. ☺️ Comments most welcome.


	2. Chapter 2

Mulder stood, rooted to the spot; not entirely grasping what he had just agreed too as Scully made her way over to the bathroom. She switched on the light in there and closed the door halfway, walked behind Mulder and turned off the overhead lights. A rectangle of glowing carpet from the bathroom, the only illumination; the lighting design now matching her mood. 

It had been a quick exchange; a test to see if she was serious._ “If it’ll help, Scully … I’d do anything for you; you know that.” _Now, she was setting the scene, preparing, and he was having second thoughts. She was injured, she’d been through a considerable ordeal, emotionally, physically. It wasn’t right. 

“Scully, I don’t think I -- I don’t think we should. I would feel like I was taking advantage of you.”

_ Such a male thing to say_. “Mulder, I know what I need. I’m not fussed where I get it. And besides -- it’d be more likely the other way ‘round.” He didn’t quite comprehend, cocked an ear toward her seeking further explanation. She crossed to him from the front door, ran her palm down his bicep and looking up at him before explaining, “More likely _me_ taking advantage of _you_.” Then she left him there, with what she had just said sinking in, made her way over to her luggage, unzipped it.

For someone who spent more waking time with his partner than he did alone—a profiler, a trained psychologist—he assumed she could no longer truly surprise him. Even when he discovered a new element to her, it was never outside the realm of expected Scully. Of course, there might be some facets of Scully’s personal life that he wasn’t aware of; maybe she was in a book club and failed to mention it. Perhaps she saw an old friend every other month for a catch up over coffee, to bitch about work and her fanatical partner. He didn’t know. But this _thing, _whatever it was she had just admitted too, seemed so incompatible with the Scully he knew. He felt that the Earth’s magnetic poles had just flipped. 

Looking across at her as she riffled through her luggage, possibly looking for some prop for what was about to occur, he realised that it was just one more thing to love about her, her ability to astonish him, despite the neat, ordered, predictable way, she usually moved through the world.

Scully had retrieved whatever it was she sought from her bag and turned back towards him slowly, purposefully walking over into his space. She began to move her hands up towards his face, and he braced himself for her palms tentatively cupping his jaw, tippy toes and hot kisses--

No.

Grabbing the edges of his leather jacket, Scully slipped it off his shoulders and down his arms, draping the removed garment over the end of one of the beds. She didn’t linger, was just helped him begin. Then she started on herself; heeled her way out of her shoes. Removed each arm from her sweater and pulled it over her head. Then hooked her thumbs into the elastic of her track pants, bending at the waist and slipping them down her legs, pulling them off, along with her socks. She placed the items neatly on the bed. Shoes together at the foot. _Ever Scully. _On straightening up, she gave Mulder the smallest of nods. Taking the cue, he kicked his shoes off too; followed by his socks and jeans.

Standing before him, Mulder took her in—quite obviously not wear a bra; her nipples pearled beneath a white V-neck T-shirt, that ended at the tops of her thighs, black briefs just visible. Her legs, despite her height, looked long, muscular—wrapped in healthy, luminous, alabaster skin. And she seemed utterly comfortable; like standing in front of Mulder in only two small items of clothing, in a dimly lit hotel room on the wrong side of midnight, was the most ordinary thing in the world. He bit his bottom lip.

Clad in his blue T-shirt and grey boxers, Mulder regarded her—his breath quivering with anticipation. Stepping resolutely into his space, she looked up at him as her hand hovered in front of his crotch. Their eyes locked and she made contact over the thin cotton fabric, began to rub along his length—he had been practically fully erect the instant the question _are you going to fuck me? _came out of his pretty partner’s lips. His breath audibly caught in his throat as he searched her expression for something more than her usual pragmatism. She stopped touching him; he was a rock, achingly hard. Collecting his hand, she pressed a silver square into his palm; the item retrieved from her bag earlier. He looked down. No, not for birth control. He guessed simpler than questions like; last health check? results? how many partners have you had? _How many haven’t you had? _ Mulder conceded would be a more apt question for him.

The condom; his instructions—and she was gone, on her way over to the bed. Mulder waited; quiet. Watched her crawl across the mattress and determined he would follow her lead as she positioned herself on her hands and knees, face close to the headboard. She looked over her shoulder at him, expectant. It was his move. He pulled his boxers down enough for his erection to pop over the top of his waistband. Tore open the packet and rolled the sheath down his shaft. Aware of her gaze upon him, he caught her look—the usual sunny ocean blue of her eyes supplanted with the agitation of a deep-sea tempest. 

Shuffling her knees apart, she kept him locked in her vision as she reached a hand between her legs, patted the bed cover there, in the middle of her calves. “Come here,” she directed, leaving her hand exactly where she wanted him.

Mulder became aware of just how dry his mouth was as he made his way over to her and moved across the bed. Positioned himself behind her; did as he was told. He kneeled up, his painfully hard dick came to rest on the top of her arse. She reached between her legs again, pulled the crotch of her underwear to one side._ His invitation. _Head spinning, he placed a palm on her cheek, over the panty line of her black cotton briefs. His brain threatened to short circuit. She was real. Her satin-soft skin in competition with the firm muscle beneath. Sucking in a breath, he tentatively ran the head of his sheathed cock between her folds. She made an affirming _‘mmm’_ sound, barely audible. He did it a few times more, and even through the condom, he could feel her grow slipperier with each swipe. She pushed back slightly, and he took the direction, pushed into her in one gentle movement, steadying himself with a hand on each hip.

“Oh. My. God,” she said in a staccato, as her head slumped forward. He pulled almost the whole way out and rocked back in. “Oh," her head was back up and arching back as she gave further sounds to her pleasure. In again and out. And then again. She steadied into a rhythm, gained control of her voice; silence before a small “mmm," on every thrust. 

A few times more and her voice, soft but commanding told him, “harder”. He thrust into her as requested, firmer. Pumped, in and out, picking up speed. “Harder,” she said again, so he gripped her a little tighter with his hands and drove into her; a muffled slap sounded into the room. The impact drove a guttural_ ‘ahhh’, _from her lips. He stayed in her, held there a moment, her walls tight and hot around him. “Again,” she directed. He withdrew and shoved again. Then again. Over and over. 

Mulder had imagined making love to Scully, _with Scully_, for so long— numerous scenarios, various places; unnumbered variables. That’s not what was happening, it wasn’t anything he’d ever imagined. Not making love. He couldn’t see her, hadn’t even kissed her; she felt like glass beneath him. Just as those thoughts passed across his mind, she increased her sacral curve, pushing her arse higher, him in deeper. Gravity dragged the hem of her shirt down, pooling at her waist, exposing her lower back. His eyes landed first on the serpent perpetually devouring itself, a sharp reminder of another time she confounded him. Then his vision was immediately taken over by the state of her back; dried blood in deep scratches, butterfly strips, deep red swollen skin, cuts, puncher marks. He was still halfway inside of her.

“Fuck Scully, your back. Oh shit.” He reached to touched her; his fingers focusing gently on a sizable bruise that had just begun its journey through the rainbow of damage. She flinched.

“Mulder, I’m fine. Don’t stop.”

He had. 

Letting out a frustrated sigh, she pushed forward, so he fell out of her. Turning over her shoulder, she regarded and him, sighing at the look on his face. Twisting herself to sit, back to the headboard, she touched the bed beside her. “Lie down,” she told him. So he did. Stretched out on his back next to her, head on a pillow, thinking this was now done. Maybe theScully he recognised would come back to him, and they could talk. He might comfort her his way; cuddles and fervent kisses on her hairline, and beautiful, reassuring words. Maybe he _could _make love with her. Maybe. Wrap her up in his embrace. Perhaps they could stay entwined that way all night. 

Except she was on top of him, straddling him. Holding and guiding him. And he was inside of her again. She was resolute. Held the headboard, as her other hand skipped beneath the fabric of her underwear. Her hand began moving; a cadence beneath black fabric, matching the rhythm of her undulating hips. Her eyes were closed, chin to the heavens. Mulder didn’t know what to do. He lay there, aching to touch her. Caress her face, kiss her cupid lips, fondle her breasts, help her busy hand. 

He gingerly reached his hand towards what he assumed was the neutrality of her upper thigh, barely making contact. Her eyes flicked open, hand from headboard to forearm, she grabbed him off her skin. Gripping his arm, she held him instead of the bedframe, to steady herself. Clasped him tight, as her eyes snapped shut again. 

She was close; he could feel her surrounding him, walls rippling. A seemingly universal pattern of breath for one teetering on the edge; her fingers and hips racing her to the finish line. Spasming, whimpering, whispers of his name and then ... her head fell violently backwards. She came undone; jerking, panting, disappearing into the abyss of her euphoria.

Mouth ajar, tongue playing with the back of her teeth as she air drew from his exhale on a tremor, nipples steel against sheer cotton. Still deep within her, Mulder forgot how to breathe. 

She drifted back down, dismounted and fell on the bed beside him.

Regarding her, Mulder couldn’t name her expression. Satisfaction? Relief? Or, perhaps it was regret.

Scully looked from his face to his still engorged cock and back. Kneeling beside him, she touched him, tentatively at first. She rolled the condom up and off, placing it on the bedside table as Mulder watched her. She returned to him, wrapped her hand firming around his base and began to shift her hand up and down.

“Scully…” he began as she pumped. He touched her hand, halting her. “It’s okay.” He was slowing shaking his head, speaking sweetly.

“But you haven’t come,” she explained releasing him.

He breathed humour sharply out his nose, shaking his head. “Scully, this wasn’t about me,” he stated. _The obvious_. He tucked himself back into his boxers, put his hands in his lap in a fruitless effort to cover his erection. Her face had fallen. He smiled at her—lovingly, in desperate attempt to stay connected. But she recoiled from him. Wounded. 

He wanted to reach out and touch her face so badly. To kiss her. Hold her. They had apparently just been as close as two people could possibly be. Absurdly, he wasn’t sure how he would ever touch her again.

Now, he recognised the look, determined. He walls well and truly up.

Nodding tightlipped in dauntless affirmation, she got off the matress, adjusted her underwear, and stepped over to the other bed. Hesitating, she turned back, “thank you. For doing -- _ that_,” she nodded toward the bed she had just fucked him on. “For tonight, for the um -- the police statement. For everything.” He wasn’t sure how to respond, so he held her gaze, a gentle smile in response. “Um, and you don’t have to stay. I’ll be fine.” 

“No, of course, I’ll stay.”

“Okay. I’m tired,” she said, turning away. “I’m going to go to sleep now.” With that, she slipped herself under the covers. Left Mulder alone and baffled and still hard.

***

She didn’t sleep. Neither of them did. 

They had both laid awake in their separate beds, in the dim light of the room, not acknowledging that they knew the other was not yet asleep. They lay like that, for well over an hour, both having silent conversations in their heads; thinking they each knew the other so well, they didn’t need them to participate. 

“Mulder,” broke the silence. 

“Yeah,” he responded, rolling towards her bed. There was quiet again. “Scully, you okay?”

“I don’t know. Do you think -- would it be okay if -- um. Would you hold me?” 

“Yeah, yeah, of course, I can.”


	3. Chapter 3

Scully walked away. Left Mulder and his hard penis alone on the other bed, hid herself in the covers; body still buzzing from her orgasm. Ultimately, she was glad for the release; though she was questioning her choice to allow Mulder to be the one to undo her. 

She heard him get up and go into the bathroom. Hoped he’d finish himself off in there; alleviate some of the guilt she felt at her selfish unbinding. 

* * *

Not sure how long she had laid awake, she felt his consciousness still in the room too as she began to rehearse a conversation with him. Image the next words, she might say after what they had done.

‘_ It was a mistake, Mulder. I’m sorry. It won’t happen again. _’ She would begin by apologising.

_ ‘That’s okay, Scully,’ _ he might answer. _ ‘I understand the need for sexual release. I use porn and...’ _

No, that didn’t sound like him. She shifted in the bed, wondered if his reply might be more along the lines of: ‘_ I don’t understand you, Scully. I thought I knew you. To have sex like that, in such a detached way. It just doesn’t seem like you...’ _

That would piss her off, so she then she would cut him off, _ ‘Mulder, you don’t know everything about me. Next time don’t presume…’ _

No, no._ Why was she angry at him? _At Mulder. Her Mulder. Who burst into her apartment on a hunch, to save her. Who cared for her, as he always had. Mulder who lied for her. And then comforted her in the outlandish and entirely inappropriate way she’d asked him to…

She was confused. Start and stop. A muddle of words and thoughts to make sense of what had happened and what it meant for them.

She wriggled further down, under the covers; hiding herself a little deeper. The frightening and strange events of the past twelve hours were beginning to catch up with her, and she was doing her level best to dodge them. 

_ I’m fine. I’m safe. _

Poking at the split on her lip with her tongue, the metallic taste compelled bile to stir in the bottom of her throat. Her head had begun to spin, and she felt her heart beat faster.

_I’m safe, I’m fine,_ on repeat in her head—a mantra to suppress, to avoid all other thought. 

_ Don’t spiral Scully, don’t spiral. _ Scully. She wondered briefly when she began to refer to herself, as Mulder did. 

_ Mulder crashing through the door. Shattered mirror ringing in her ears. Lids shut tight, finger on the trigger. And she squeezed. Held onto her breath and clutched at time. Eyes ripped open at the sound. Flashes stealing her attention. Sparks from the bullet—that tore Pfaster’s life from him through his flesh—crashing into a bulb on the ceiling. _

_ I was in control. I am strong— _ overtaking Scully’s thoughts. Attempting to convincing her she was powerful. That this time, _ she _ took from _ him _. Took the son-of-a-bitch’s last fucking breath. 

_ I’m. Fine. I’m fine. _

_Focus, Scully._ Bringing herself back into the room, she splayed her palm over her heaving chest. _ I’m here. I’m safe. _ Mulder is here. _ I’m here. I’m safe. _ Mulder...

What was she saying to him? Deciding on a different tack to begin her make-believe conversation, she wouldn’t start by apologising, instead—just telling him the truth.

_ ‘Mulder, I’ve never been any good at relationships. I know that about myself now. With Tom … I never really liked him. We had a one-night stand, and he was kind of enamoured of me—a bit like a puppy dog. The sex was okay. And I didn’t have to make any kind of commitment at all. I didn’t even have to commit to being nice to him. He’s just my way to let off steam. It doesn’t mean anything. It really doesn’t.’ _

She didn’t know why, but she felt she needed to explain that part to Mulder. That there was zero emotional attachment. It was actually more the opposite; an emotional disengagement. 

Imaginary Mulder just listened, no comeback to her honestly. 

_ ‘Any relationship I’ve had had a kill switch built-in. An easy rationalisation for me to end it. Any excuse, other than me having to face the truth—that it possibly had something to do with me. The truth that maybe … I am just incapable of loving someone ..., _’ 

Scully’s thoughts trailed off. Unsure she if she wanted Mulder to know that last part. But then, those loathsome thoughts were at bay, and their exchange wasn’t real, so… 

_ ‘There needed to be a reason from the start, a justification as to why I’d ultimately end up running away: he was married, he lived across the country, I was too busy becoming a doctor, he was my teacher … she was a _ she _ , and I was a good catholic girl, with a strict navy captain father… _’ 

She didn’t believe that last one. About her college relationship not working out because it was with a woman. In theory, she had no problem being with a woman. Just not _ that _one, and she couldn’t even put her finger on why it didn’t work out. Why any of them never worked out. The truth, the simple reason that they were simply not compatible, never actually occurred to her. 

Trailing away from her fictional admissions, she wondered what the ‘kill switch’ for _ them _ would be. For her an Mulder. How she would fuck that up—notwithstanding her own perceived intimacy issues—if it ever happened between them. She pondered that his blinding intensity—evocative of the love and authority her father had had for and over her—might be all-consuming. Awareness that her behaviour around Mulder reflected how she wanted him to see her was not new. Reminiscent of how she learned from a young age that life was easier if she curbed her actions to her father’s expectations; seeing herself through his eyes, and becoming that. A self-written though somewhat vital requirement, to be the men in her life’s versions of her. Recognising that those patterns both served and stifled her, she feared she wouldn’t know where _ she _was, in their possible relationship.

Listening to Mulder’s breath, she was unsure if he was sleeping. _ Mulder. _ What was she thinking; how could they even begin? She couldn’t go _ there _ with him. How would she couple the care and tenderness she felt so deeply for him, with her burning desire to fuck him senseless? All the fucking time! Intimacy issues. She never could do both successfully. _ Love and fuck. _ That many failed relationships, there had to be something wrong with her, right?

Her reveries did not make perfect sense, turning to wonder at how Mulder might respond to those thoughts. Would he counter with something about how her intimacy and love life problems were not an uncommon phenomenon? A twist on the Madonna-whore complex. Feelings that the sexual, and caring parts of oneself, were somehow mutually exclusive. Even without all his psychological knowledge, she could surmise that he’d know something on the subject.

_ ‘Stop psychoanalysing me.’ _

Why was her subconscious so pissed off at him? 

Missy used to worry about that part of Dana’s _ complicated personality _ , as she put it. That Scully couldn’t love someone and let herself _ be _ with them in a genuinely open, sexual way. Scully would counter that the reason for the mind-blowing sex was _ because _ she didn’t care for the person. 

_ ‘You can’t separate your heart from your desire, Dana’ _ , she would say. _ ‘They are supposed to go together, to make us whole…. To help us recognise our soul mate.’ _

Scully never let on to Melissa how frightened she was, that it was true. That she was defective in that way. Instead, she would roll her eyes at her beautiful big sister’s cosmic slant on how the world worked. 

_ Oh, Missy. _Another compartment locked away in her grief-stricken heart. The torture of the tight-rope walk between wanting to remember every minute detail of her beloved dead sister, and the need to forget the excruciating pain of wandering through the rest of her life without that part of herself. So, most of the time, she did neither. Neither remembered nor suffered. Just locked it all away somewhere she barely remembered how to get to. 

Why, when she was at her most vulnerable, did every fucking miserable thing, threaten to float from the murky depths to break the surface of her resolve?

Mulder moved. She heard him in his bed, roll over onto his side, maybe. Was he facing her now? Or was she being given his back?

Truthfully, these fictitious exchanges she was running through, whilst keeping attention off Pfaster, were designed to block off something else. The real elephant in the room she didn’t want to pervade her mind. Hearing him in the room brought reality crashing down on her. 

They had just had sex. 

More truthfully, she had essentially masturbated, while riding him. 

Her cheeks grew hot under the memory, and she willed the tacky old mattress to split down the middle and suck her to another place. During, she tried to push away what was growing inside; hot and uncomfortable. Absent when she screwed Tom. A feeling that for her, did not go hand in hand with the relief she sought from sex.

It was Mulder.

She had tried to halt her thoughts and feelings by grabbing his forearm. Stopping his touch. A truth just under the surface threatening to drown her.

Lying there, she was feeling sorry for herself and more than a little fucked up. Only a day ago, she was the perfect picture of control, order, professionalism. Ever the straight-A student, who folded her clothes into her luggage, even if she knew they’d be unpacked straight into the wash. A get-to-work-early, hand-in-every-report-on-time, kind of woman. A reliable FBI agent, with no personal life to make things murky. No spouse fearful at home who might make stepping into her dangerous job every day a more difficult affair than it naturally already was. Scully was an island. 

Then, seemingly in the blink of an eye, she had been tied down, beaten up and marked for death and defilement. Reminded that, especially as a woman, someone else can inflict disorder on you. Control can be torn from your desperate hands. Vulnerability exposed as quickly as a towel ripped from your body, in a college dorm hallway. 

Scully was faced with the knowledge that the compartment of her domineering need for sexual released had been seen. She had, in her shocked state, opened it. Exposed herself at the wrong time. To the wrong person. _ Or had she? _ Maybe she wanted Mulder to see. To know she has desires. To have those two parts of herself, that she kept so far apart, come crashing together for him to witness. The idea was frightening to her, and her anxiety threatened to wash over her again.

Something within her yearned for the security of his physical embrace whilst concurrently rejecting any notion of a wish to discuss her feelings with him.

Mulder was just a few feet away. Awake, she suspected. Her simultaneous need to control herself around him, and her want to be consumed by him, loomed large every day. In the unremarkable double-room at a three-star hotel at 2:33 in the morning, the latter was winning. 

He had indulged her earlier request. Fucked her. Why should asking for comfort be so hard? To reach out and grasp the security she so desperately needed. 

“Mulder—”

The moment the word propelled from her mouth, broke out into the darkened, silent room, anxiety began to suffocate her—walls closing in.

Managing to request that he hold her, he answered with, _of course._

And he began to make his way over to her bed.


	4. Chapter 4

He lifted her covers and slid in beside her. She wriggled close, lifted her head as he offered his arm under her neck. They faced each other; his arms wrapped her up. Her hand fell to his chest. Her breath slowed to match the rhythm that was gently making her palm rise and fall. She closed her eyes. Sighed deeply. Safe. She began to let sleep wash over her. Pleased that, somehow, he didn’t speak. She allowed herself to enjoy the security she felt in the physical cocoon on offer. She felt his lips on her forehead as she sank further into the asylum of his embrace. Then feather-light fingertips caressed her wounded back. Contented sounds from him. Their bare legs began to tangle, and she let go. The light would be here soon, revealing more than the bad decor of the room. She could talk then, maybe explain. Maybe. But for now, unconscious respite took over.

* * *

She felt him, before she saw him. Some how they’d moved closer in the night. Snuggled deeper. Her lips grazed his bare chest, nestled in the vee of his t-shirt. Her head tucked under his chin; even supine they fit together like this. His hand rested on the soft skin of her thigh, close, very close to her panty line. The knee that belonged to the caressed leg was bent up, pointing at him and lying on top of the inside of his knee, that was pointed at her. Their other legs stretched together, down the bed; two pairs of legs as ‘number fours’ in reflection. Entwined. 

His pattern of breath let her know he was awake. She remained motionless. Tried to still her lungs. Not wanting to break the spell. Something gave her away, and she felt his hand move. Run the rest of the way up her thigh before snaking its way under the hem of her shirt. 

“How is your back this morning?” he asked, gently feeling for himself.

She allowed herself a deep breath. He sounded exactly like her normal Mulder. The world didn’t end overnight. Perhaps things would be ok, be normal; he would treat her the same as he did before...before she… Snapshots of last night flicked through her mind: underwear to the side, pumping hips, stilling his hand in an aggressive grip, her unbridled pleasure on display, and … oh..., oh lord, she tried to give him a fucking hand job…. and he refused.

“Um, I’m not sure yet.” She answered finally, again willing the bed to consume her, or maybe she’d get lucky and an alien mothership would fly by and beam her the fuck out of there.

She was burning. 

“I just, um….” She didn’t finish, just rolled out of his arms and off the bed. Heading towards the bathroom. 

“I just, I might take a shower.” She said, not looking back at him, escaping behind the door.

Water would wash it all away. 

She turned on the shower and slipped her garments to the floor. She stepped in and leant her arms, bent at the elbows, on the cold tiles, her forehead resting on her forearms. She let the water cascade over her hair, drum onto her shoulders and slip away down her ruined back. She willed the falling water to baptise her, to cleanse her sins away; maybe wash her down the drain along with them.

She heard his voice. But it didn’t make sense. He got louder.

“Mulder, I can’t hear you.” She called out through the water.

The bathroom door cracked opened. 

“I just said I was going to pop out and get us some breakfast. I won’t be long.”

“Ok. Thank you.” She called as the bathroom door clicked shut.

She couldn’t escape him. Escape having to explain herself. When he comes back, she thought, she would ask him to listen. So that she might help him understand what happened for her last night. Understand a little bit more why she did, the things she did. That was the least he deserved.

* * *

He’d been awake for a while. Scully was still asleep. Her small frame still wrapped in his embrace. Her head was tucked under his chin and he could feel her sweet breath on his chest. He gently stroked her hair and placed his lips to the top of her head. He so hoped that when she woke, she wouldn’t close off to him. Wouldn’t be embarrassed about last night. Ultimately, he wanted her to be ok. Selfishly, he wanted that to include loving him. 

He moved his hand, under the covers and put it back at the top of her thigh, his cock slightly moved at the contact. Her skin was warm and soft, stretched over taut muscle. He noticed her breathing change. She’s awake, he thought, but deathly still. Perhaps pretending to still be asleep. He could only imagine the things running through her head, so he decided to break her contemplation. He gently moved his hand under her shirt to touch her back. He asked her how it was. She took a long while to answer that she didn't know, and then she disappeared from his arms, into the bathroom.

He laid there for a while. Holding onto the warmth of the bed, where her body just lay. Trying to keep her heat there under the palm of his hand. Trying to hold onto her as she slipped, like sand, through his fingers. 

He listened to the shower start and used that as his cue to pick himself up. He dressed in yesterday’s clothes. Remembered her taking it off him, as his slipped his jacket on. He grabbed the key to the room and his wallet, before calling out to Scully through the bathroom door. No answer. Again, louder. She yelled back that she couldn't hear him, so he cracked the door opened and said again that he was going to pop out to grab them some breakfast.

Today it was Dave. He never used Fox when asked for his name to go with an order. He once tried Mulder but that proved just as confusing as Fox. He sat himself on a bench as he waited for coffee and bagels.

He’d put it off for far too long; telling Scully how he really feels about her. After last night, nearly losing her to that evil fucking bastard, and then finding out that she’s at least giving her body over to some other guy, he’s got nothing to lose by telling her. Quite frankly, everything to lose if he doesn’t. Because she is everything. 

He tries to push the image of Scully fucking a stranger, the way he was fucked last night, out of his mind. It feels like someone has brought a sledge hammer down, cracking it on the top of his skull. The blood dripping down, draining from his head and making him shiver as it runs down his face. His head spins. 

_Dave._

He knew enough about human behaviour that she was emotionally detached last night, she stopped him when he tried to connect. The whole thing had nothing to do with him, and he presumed that was how it was with this other guy. He tried to take some small comfort in that.

_Dave…_

He doesn’t know why it surprised him so much. Realising that Scully has desires. In his fantasies of her, she certainly did. He now saw that they really were everything to one another, except lovers. And why couldn’t they be that too? It had to be an inevitability, right? Now, he was going to give fate the nudge it needed. He was resolved. He’d march back into the room, ask her to sit down and just listen, so he could pour his heart out. Tell her everything he had to say.

“Yo, Dave!” A voice boomed.

Mulder shook himself out of his reverie. “Ah yeah. Here.” 

He retrieved his order and made his way back to the room. Back to Scully.

***

When he arrived, she was curled in a chair in her bath robe, drying her hair with a towel. He walked over to her, holding out her coffee, putting the paper bag on the table beside her. She took it from him with a tiny smile. No eye contact. “Thanks”.

He pointed to the bag and announced, “cream cheese bagel”. 

She raised an eyebrow at him, (not quite her gaze). He nodded, knowingly.

“Yes, real cream cheese.”

She gave him a hasty smiled, and took a sip of her coffee.

Mulder moved over to the bed, put his breakfast on the bedside table and leaned back against the headboard, stretching his long legs out. He took a swig of his hot drink before looking over at Scully. A million words dancing on his lips.

Before he can speak, she wants to know, “what did Skinner say about today?”

“Um, nothing. He doesn’t expect even me back in for a few days. Wants me to, I guess, make sure you’re alright.” He says this trying to gauge if that was a good thing to her, that he has effectively been assigned to hang out with her, in a double hotel room, for a few days.

“Ok. Thanks. That’s good, I guess. I’m not ready to go back to work yet.” She takes another sip. Peaks into her breakfast bag. Not really interested in having it yet. Just buying a little more time.

“Scully, I just…” he starts.

“No, wait Mulder. I need to say something. Can… can I go first?” She asks, looking at him for the first time today.

Mulder wasn’t expecting this. He had it all planned. “Ah, of .. of course. Go ahead.”

She took a deep breath. “I’m sorry about last night.”

He begins to say something. She shakes her head. 

“No, please. Let me finish.”

He smiles faintly and nods encouragement at her.

Another deep breath. “I’ve never been good at relationships, Mulder. Sex for me is really just a way to let off steam. And I guess I’ve struggled with really being able to um, let myself go with a guy.... um people, a person.... that I think, you know ... respects me. Someone who I care for....” She was tripping up a little, but not getting too flustered. She had to get this out. 

“I’d want them to see me as their equal, not some object of desire. And then, if I didn't have that relationship with someone, I'd find it easier to um,... sleep with them... So… I guess, maybe…." She screwed up her face, she'd run out of the right words. "Does that make any sense to you…?” she looked up at him, willing him to say he understood so they could just get back to how things were before…

“Yeah, I get it. Of course, I do. Both men and women sometimes find integrating sensuality and an ideal femininity difficult to do, within the same relationship.” He sounded like he was giving a direct quote from a textbook. He probably was.

Scully smiled to herself, with the accompaniment of the faintest chuckle. 

“What?” He questioned.

“Oh, nothing.” She said, still smiling.

“No, tell me?” He’s curious now.

“I um, just, I guess… I just imagined you’d understand.” She says, feeling somewhat relieved. 

“I understand it Scully, as a pattern of behaviour. But, I need you to know, that I’m not like that. I don’t divide you into compartments. I see you as all things. As the person I trust most in the world, as the smartest person I know, as my equal in the field, as…”

She cut him off there, thinking she hadn’t made her point clear.

“Yeah but Mulder, but… what about me as a _woman_? Someone with desires. Someone to _be_ desired. You don’t see me that way. And if you did, maybe it would change all those other things you see in me, that I work at so hard at every day, your respect, your trust….”

“I can see you both ways Scully.” He cut her off, his frustration beginning to surface. 

He shifted himself to the edge of the bed. Planted his feet on the floor, elbows on his knees. He catches his head in his hands. Runs his fingers though his hair. He has to tell her.

“I’ve… I’ve been seeing you both ways, for the last goddam seven years, Scully." He looks up at her now. "You, you, my capable, unwavering, intelligent, colleague… partner at work and in…. in my lonely fucking apartment, you’re my saviour. My salvation. I dream of you Scully. You’re a smart, beautiful, sexy creature and…. its everything I can do every day… not to bend you over my desk and fuck your brains out. And not because you’re an object, but because you're you. Because you’re Scully….. And because I.... I......"

She was looking at him. Trying to absorb what he just admitted. He was looking at her too. Searching her face for any reaction.

“Have you never thought of me that way?” He quietly asked of her. Looking like he might cry. Desperate for the right answer.

Mulder was being so honest with her; she took a breath, and told the truth. 

“I do. I have.” She told him. She saw relief begin to wash over him, too early. “But I can’t.” She felt that familiar sensation of tears, beginning in the back of her throat. “Not with you.” She was slowly shaking her head, willing the tears back.

“What do you mean, you can’t?”

“I’ll fuck it up, Mulder. I always do.” A sob escaped from deep inside as her tears betrayed her. “I care about you so much. But, I’m afraid. I’m so afraid that I don’t know how to..." This was her truth as she knew it.

The thing was, Scully was often wrong. She didn’t know that about herself. Every time a new case slid across their desk, she’d smugly spout her science, and impose probable explanations on him; but most of the time she was wrong. And now, her notion that she was incapable of loving someone was wrong too. She knew how to love. Deeply. Passionately. She loved Mulder that way. So much it was blinding. He was everything to her. She loved, cared for and nurtured him. She was wonderful at loving him. What she didn’t know how to do, was let herself be truly seen. To let herself be loved. 

“That doesn’t make any sense Scully. What do you mean?”

“I mean, I can’t risk it Mulder. You mean the world to me. You’re my best friend, I trust you more than anyone. You’re the first person I want to talk to when I wake up and the last person I think of when I close my eyes at night… I think sometimes we know each other better than we know ourselves…. I’m saying….I’m not sure I could live my life without you in it. So, I can’t… I can’t risk what we have. Risk losing you.”

“Scully, for all of those reasons..., and for me, I feel exactly the same way you do.... but all of those reasons aren't reasons why we can't be together, all of those reasons are exactly why we should be. Why we have to try. And, what you just described, Scully, that’s what love is….. Scully, please..." his voice trailed away, but his eyes continued his plea.

She couldn’t speak. The tears were streaming now. Silently. She looked up at him and bit her lip. Stuck. Forwards to him, or run at of the goddamn room….. She so desperately wanted to run to him. He was waiting for her to do something….say something. Say anything.... 

"I'm so sorry Mulder. God, I'm so fucked up!" She was shaking her head again as the words came. "I don't know how. I'm so sorry."

“I fucking love you Scully! Please, let me love you! Scull….” His breath caught in his throat. He sucked his bottom lip between his teeth. A tear spilling over his bottom lashes. Scully was stuck in his gaze. Her breathing matching his. Now, honestly, if she’d been within a foot of him, her lips would probably be crashing onto his right now. But she wasn’t. She was an ocean way across the other side of the room. And she couldn’t move. She had no words, and every lousy thing she ever wanted to confess to him. The start of a thousand conversations wanting to spill out. But nothing came. And the longer she stayed there, the more she wanted to retreat from the truth that had just been exposed. Mulder was beginning to unravel the biggest, scariest compartment of them all. Pulling at a foundational Jenga block inside of her, that all the others were stacked upon. Maybe she should let him. Maybe she could love…

There are moments in time, when you have no choice but to be present, to front up. She was living one of those moments right now. And it was overwhelming her. 

They stared at each other. Both through tears. Tears from him, for fear of losing her. Tears for her, for fear of losing herself. The intensity of this instant threatening to devour them. The charge in the air was palpable. Somebody had to move. Towards or away. Something had to happen... 

“Scully…. Please come here.” He begged. 

That was it. That was what she needed. An instruction. Her brain wasn’t working but now her legs were, and they were moving her over to the bed. Across to him. She stood in front of him. Close, between his knees. He reached out and wrapped his arms around her, incidentally landing across her backside. He buried his face in the soft fabric over her abdomen. Her hand fell through his hair. 

“I’ll love you enough for both of us, Scully. Please let me try.” 

She didn’t answer, just cupped his face in her hands and moved him away from her so she could look at him. She bent her head down and kissed his tears. Tasting the salty manifestation of his love for her.


	5. Chapter 5

Scully kissed Mulder’s tears away, then straightened up and looked into his eyes. His soulful, hazel eyes. She could lose herself in there. Or perhaps, that’s exactly where she would find herself. 

His hands had moved from around her and settled on her hips. He looked up to her, searching her eyes for something. He had never known eyes that could make him fall in love a thousand times a day, as equally as they could shoot down one of his outlandish takes on the unexplained. He loved those eyes. He looked into her, trying to reach her, seeking a response to his request before.  _ Please, let me love you.  _

Her hands still cupped his face, and she held him there as she moved closer to press her lips to his. His lips. Just the gentlest meeting of their lips, as they both began to move them, was more intimate than their union only hours before. Lips exploring lips. Tongues meeting, licking, tasting. Mouths opening. Welcoming. The kiss of an age. All of their history, all of the intimate moments and embraces that had gone before, that might have been chased with a kiss, were culminating between them. All of the times they’d lost then found one another, all of the times they held each other through grief, all of the times they’d saved each other, all of the times they’d woken to the other by their bedside; and a thousand moments in between. It was long, and languid, and soft and passionate. All lips and tongues and hands on cheeks and sentimental tears. More said than all the words they’d managed this morning. Perhaps ever. 

They slowly disconnected. Replacing lips with eyes. With tentative contemplations and loaded looks. Mulder kept Scully's gaze as he pulled at the sash on her robe. The knot slipped undone with the greatest of ease and the robe swung open. Before he had a chance to admire the half-hidden vision before him, she pushed the robe off her shoulders and it pooled on the floor, leaving her standing in between his legs, in only her cotton briefs. His eyes swept over her body and then up to her face. 

“Jesus, Scully. You are so fucking beautiful.”

She blinked lazily down at him. He ran his hands up her sides from her waist, landing adjacent to her breasts. He drew himself to her and hungrily seized her breast in his mouth. Sucking at her. Licking. Circling his tongue and gently tugging at her nipple, with gentle teeth. His hand caressed her other breast, holding its fullness. She let her head fall back. He removed his mouth for a moment and licked her, his tongue dragging from the underside of her breast, up and over her nipple onto her chest. Kneading the volume of the other in his hand. Pinching at her, now hardened nipple. Her hands fell to his head. Holding him to her chest, running her fingers through his hair.

“Mmm, mmm. That feels so good.”

He repeated the same on her other breast. Licking up and over, before returning and taking her into his mouth, more than just her nipple, wanting to consume her. He pulled back and concentrated his tongue and teeth on the hard, pink blush, before wrapping his mouth around her breast again. His hands moved around her waist and tucked into the elastic of her underwear, fingers caressing the soft flesh of her arse. 

Fervently, she grabbed his face in her hands again, pulled him from her breast, forced her lips to his. Kissing and releasing, capturing his taste, determinedly not missing a fragment of his mouth. She was also making sure her mind didn't take over, begin to examine what was happening. She wanted, needed, all of him.  _ Right now. _

“I want to touch you, Mulder ... Touch you everywhere.” She breathed into his mouth.

He groaned.

Her hands moved. She silently helped him remove his jacket. Then went further than last night, pulling on the hem of his shirt, drawing it up, over his head. She took both of his hands in hers, and he obliged, letting her pull him up from the bed. She unbuttoned his jeans, and slid the zip down, dragging pressure over his erection as she went. He heeled his way out of his shoes, and she knelt before him, grabbing the fabric of his jeans and boxes, slowly sliding them down, caressing his skin as she went.

Naked Mulder. Standing before her. She ran her hands up his legs, along his length as she rose.

“Lie down,” she instructed, “face down on the bed.”

Mulder lay down, as told, and turned his face to the side where Scully knelt beside him. 

She began at the top of his head. Ran her hands through his hair. Stroked a finger along his cheek bone, swept it down his nose and across his lips. He captured it as it went past. Gently sucked her digit into his mouth. Swirled around it with his tongue. She retrieved her finger and leaned down to kiss where it had just trailed. Licked at his bottom lip. 

She knelt up beside him again, focused her efforts on his back. He had a beautiful back. Smooth and muscular and strong. A wonderful muse, she thought. Why bother with such splendour, only to cover it in dress shirts and unimaginative, dark jackets. Her mouth followed her hands. Caressing and tracing and kissing and licking. Detailing him. 

Her journey brought her to his arse. She painted him with her palms. Gently drew patterns with finger nails. Squeezed his flesh and ran her fingers between his cheeks. Her hands swept down his legs and back up, concentrated on his inner thighs. Hands slipped between his legs and her fingers press down on his premium, fondled him, ran back up between his glutes. She bent her head down and placed a kiss, first on one cheek, and then the other.

“Scully, did you just kiss my arse?” Mulder teased.

A smile broke out across her face, and she giggled. All the tension, built up from the strange, past 24 hours hours, began leaving her body. She draped herself across his bare back, her face landing near his shoulder blade. She kissed him there, once her giggling subsided enough to bring her lips together. Mulder laughed too. 

He used this moment to say, “Scully. I haven’t had sex in a really long time. Well,” he corrected himself, “apart from last night.” 

“Ok,” she began. “It's ok Mulder. It’s like riding a bike.” 

She let her lips touch his warm tanned skin. 

“Except in that analogy I might have just called myself a bike….”

She smiled to herself, and returned to her position, kneeling, beside him. 

“No, that’s not what I meant.”

“Oh?” her focus moved to the nape of his neck, with lips and teeth. 

“I just meant that, if you’ve always used protection, and if you don’t mind… you don’t need ... we don’t have to um ... Use ...” He trailed off. The rest of the thought, they both knew, would bring up Scully’s infertility. 

“Oh, right,” she answered. “I always have ... used protection.” She turned to look down at him as she spoke. The look between them held a touch of sorrow, there was tenderness though, and understanding. “So, I’m fine if we don’t.” She affirmed.

“Now,” she said letting a smile touch her lips, “roll over, before I  _ kick _ your arse this time.”

He grinned and rolled himself onto his back. She’d planned to touch him all over in this position too, but looking now, his cock beckoned her. She bent down and gently wrapped her hand around his base, holding him still. She licked his head and took him in her mouth, staying there for a moment, swirling her tongue. She breathed a deep breath, through her nose and then out as she slid him the whole way in. Running her tongue along his ridges as she went.

“Oh fuck, Scully. That feels ... unbelievable.” Mulder breathed.

She began to move her head up and down, her lips dragging pleasure along his shaft, accompanied by her tongue and hand. Her other hand joining in, cupping his balls, gently pulling and tugging as he breathed sounds of gratification into the room.

Eyes closed to the pleasure, his hand felt its way between Scully’s knees. He then slowly dragged his fingers up the satin skin of her inner thigh and ever so lightly began to caress her crotch. Gently, through her underwear, he traced her slit. Feather soft. Back and forth, teasing, over and again. Light strokes. He could feel the dampness seeping through her underwear. He slipped a finger between the top of her leg and the fabric. She was so wet, and slippery. He continued his path from before. Tracing the line again, this time pushing between her lips. She drove down, into his hand. Lowering herself so that his finger entered her as far as it would go. He pushed his thumb past the fabric too, swiping it over her clitoris. She moaned, as she continued her devotion of his cock.

“Scully,” he panted, “I need to taste you. Now.” 

That was part of his reason for stopping her, the other, to halt the sensation growing within him, and threatening to cut short their copulation, before it even began.

Scully kissed the tip of his erection and gave him a last stroke with her hand. 

He removed his hand from between her legs and sucked his fingers into his mouth. Licking her essence. 

“Lay down” he said, sitting up, “here, on your side, so you don’t hurt your back.” 

He arranged a pillow for her head before helping her off with her underwear. She lay down on her side, she stretched out on the bed. He placed another pillow in front of her torso, for her to lean into. She tucked the knee from her top leg in front of her for more balance.

Mulder moved his way down her body, straddling her outstretched leg, settling below her arse. He caught his hand behind her bent knee, pushing, so the angle between her breast and the top of her leg diminished, making more room for his exploration. Then he ran his hand over her stomach, through her patch of pubic hair and dipped a finger between her folds, gently brushing her clitoris. 

He ran a palm up, over her pussy, spreading her juices up to her navel and then making a trail back down, over her clit again, through her folds and between her cheeks, before moving off course to grab at her perfect round arse. Scully’s body writhed with pleasure under his hands, undulating her response as he repeatedly dragged over her abdomen, her cunt, her arse.

He lowered himself onto the bed, lying on his side facing her, his face in the scissor junction of her legs. He took her bent knee and put himself in its place, draping her leg over his shoulder. He was poised, face directly in front of Scully’s beautiful pussy. His mouth wrapped around her hood and her hands shot to his head to steady herself. To affirm her connection with him. He hungrily began to undo her. Licking her folds and sucking her clit. Swapping between them, her hips rolled in return. 

“Hmmm, you taste so good.” He managed between his hungry devotion.

She moved her leg, placed her foot flat on the bed behind his head, her knee now pointed to the ceiling, her leg turn out from her hip, opening herself for him. Two fingers slipped into her at this invitation. Her pelvis jolted forward as she let out a moan. He circled her clit with his tongue and curled the fingers inside of her, forward, pushing them into her pubic wall. Swirling, flicking, pushing, pumping. He could feel that she was on the verge.

“Oh … that feels amazing. Oh my God, Mulder. Oh fuck. Keeping … doing ... that.” 

He continued to tease her. To please her. Repeating the exquisite pattern. Lapping and flicking and circling and pulsing. His fingers pumped in and out, finding that spot again and pushing. Over and over again.

He removed his mouth, replaced his tongue with his thumb.

“Scully, how do you want to come?”

“You, inside me. Now, Mulder.”

“Stay right where you are.”

She remained on her side. Her bottom leg stretched out down the bed, her other knee returned to its position, bent in front to keep her steady. Mulder straddled her out-stretched leg again, landing at the top of her thigh. He took a hand full of her arse cheek, he spread her open, so he could slowly guide himself into her. He pushed in slowly until he was completely encased. She let out a long, slow 'mmmm'. Guttural. 

He pulled back, then pushed back in. Her eyes closed and she gripped onto the bed cover. He began to pump in and out. One hand remaining on her cheek, opening her with each thrust. A slow rhythm at first. Stretching her. His other hand reached down and pinched a nipple between his fingers. Her hand immediately came up and covered his. Pressing it down into the volume of her breast. Pushing at his fingers. 

“You can pinch them hard. I like it.”

"Ok god. Ok, Scully. Fuck you're so hot." And then he does, he pinches them. Hard. She lets out a yelp. He spreads her further with his hand, he is in so deep. He gives another vice squeeze to her nipple before moving his hand between her legs, pushing the underside on her thigh closing the gap between her torso, giving him clearer access to her clit. He circles her. 

“You pinch them, Scully. I want to see you play with your nipples.”

She obliged, pinching and teasing, matching the rhythm he was making on her clit with his clever fingers. Her eyes were squeezed shut. Her brow furrowed. Her breathing, short.

“Scully. Open your eyes. I want you to look at me.”

It took her a moment to do as he’d asked. But she does. She opens her eyes and turns her head to look at him. He has lust filled, hooded eye;, but mostly she just sees  _ him. _

“I love you. So much.” He tells her.

She goes to close her eyes again.

“Stay with me, Scully. Stay with me. Look at me.” He implores again.

Her eyes open and they find his. For some reason she had stupid tears in her eyes, a goddamn lump in her throat. Her breathing quickened. Her pulse raced. Sweat was beading on her chest and forehead. 

_ He can see me. All of me. _ And she was letting him. Herself. Her true self, that included all things. 

She bit her bottom lip. Her whole being was about to explode. Her emotions, her love, her control. She had never felt so loved, and so desired before. She felt herself begin to let go. A thought flicked across her mind so fast she almost couldn’t hang onto it. Maybe this is what Melissa had been talking about. That once she allowed someone to see both of those sides of herself; her love and her desire, when she chose to have them exist together, that's how she would know she had found her soulmate. That realisation hung in the air, and mixed with her euphoria. Her tears were replaced with the words that had threatened to escape her lips, all morning. 

“Mulder, I love you too.” She bit her lip and them continued. “So, fucking much.”

A sob, and her orgasm erupted simultaneously. A feeling so intense she felt she might be ripped in two.

“Ahhh, ohhh. Oh my God, Mulder….. “

“I love you, Scully.” He spoke, fighting tears at her words.

He continued to slowly pump her through her orgasm, until she stilled him with her hand. She looked up to him and let out a contented sigh. And a smile. A true, beautiful smile, revealing her gums. Fuck, he lived to see that smile. That look of contentment hadn’t adorned her lovely face, in way too long. His heart swelled knowing that he was here to witness it, that he helped put it there, and that maybe he could spend the rest of his life finding ways to make it reappear. A new quest. 

She looked at him and contemplated for a moment. 

“Mulder, that was..." she swallowed, but willed herself to go on. Stay open. "I’ve honestly never felt that before." She felt so whole. So fully present, under his gaze. It burned. Burned so bright. 

He withdrew himself and leaned over her, placed a kiss to her lips.

"Thank you." She told him. Not for that kiss. A thank you for this place. This new place they'd found. Here together.

“Now,” a new tone to her voice, “….you know how you said before, that it was everything you could do not to bend me over your desk and … ”

She broke off. Bit her bottom lip suggestively. 

“Mmm Hmm.” He managed.

“I want you to fuck me like that.”

This threw him for a second. Just a second, before a beautiful Mulder smirk spread across his face. 

“Oh, I can fuck you like that, Scully. Don’t worry about that.” He began as he moved to change position. “Ok, on your knees, hands on the headboard.” He instructed, helping her up off the bed.

She did as she was told.

“Now, this will be just a prelude, because you’re injured, ok? But don’t worry, I’ll still fuck you good and proper. You'll tell me if I hurt you, ok?”

“Ok”, she nodded as she moved into her new position, kneeling at the head of the bed, her hands gripped the upholstery, knees slightly apart. 

First, he gently caressed her back. Kissed over the cuts and bruises. Tenderly ran his hands over her wounds. Traced around her tattoo, before leaning up to her ear.

“You ready?” He whispered.

She turned her head, so her lips met his. She lovingly kissed him, before pushing her tongue into his mouth. They lapped at each other. Mouths opening, tongues swirling, lips sliding. She broke the kiss, and told him with a smile and a nod that she was ready.

He placed a big strong hand on the inside of one of her knees, guiding it out from the other. He didn’t lose contact, as his hand ran up the inside of her thigh, grazing her wet pussy on its journey past, down the other leg, pushing that knee out too. Widening her for him. His hands returned to the dampness between her legs and he spread her apart with one hand, steadying himself at her hip with the other. Without warning he plunged himself inside. Holding her there as she squirmed. He would have given her arse a playful slap here, but that could wait for another time. A time with some distance between her, and her recent ordeal.

His hands reposition, lightening fast. One at her breast, kneading and pinching, the other drawing circles over clit. Slowly at first, before building to a methodical rhythm you could set a metronome to. Hands, fingers and hips all moving in time to the same beat. Pulsing into her being. He bent over her now, as he pulled her up slightly into him. Her back flush to his chest. Moving together in affinity. Pulling her in, holding her pleasure in his hands. She let her head rest back on his shoulder, exposing her neck and ear. His lips clamped onto her earlobe, sucked it into his mouth. His pinched at her nipple, getting incrementally harder. She let him, so he didn’t stop. The fingers on his other hand were deftly swirling her, as he listened to her breathing, stopping just before she peaked. Giving her just enough time to come back from the edge before pushing her there again. 

He had her. His forearm across her chest, a hand full of her breast, his other hand firming between her legs, pulling them closer still. Pumping harder now. 

“I’m not hurting you am I, Beautiful?” 

“No, Mulder. You could never hurt me.”

Her head rolled to her shoulder, meeting his. His mouth engulfed hers, as his thrusts grew impossibly stronger. This time she was on the edge, he didn’t relent. He pushed her over and jumped right after. Their mouths locked, not in a kiss but a connection of their souls. Breathing their pleasure, into one another. Hot liquid pulsing deep into her. Filling her up. Sounds escaping, before being swallowed. Jerking and writhing and spiralling and shaking and stars. As one. 

They both fell onto the bed. Naked bodies, sweaty and heaving. Wrapping themselves in each other. Kisses to the bare flesh within reach.

After breathing their way back into themselves, and lips had lingered on exposed skin, their hands found one another and interlocked, eyes had affirmed their connection, he spoke. 

“I love you, so much, Scully” he said, as he brought his hand to his lips and pressed them into her soft skin. His smile was of a contented man. Like all the world and all his worries had melted away; his prize tangled in his arms.

“I love you too, Mulder.” She told him, softly, as she poked at her lip with her tongue once more. The split burst open from kissing. The warm coppery taste reminding her that she could be damaged, but also, that she was real. 

She also now knew that she could also be loved. Could love.

“I’m scared, too…” … her voice trailing off, even softer than before.

“I know you are.” He reached his hand out and tucked an errant lock of hair behind her ear. “What scares you the most?" He asked, moving his hand to cup her cheek as he spoke. 

"I’m scared … of how big my feelings for you are.” She placed her hand over his on her cheek, “it's overwhelming Mulder, ... and so, I guess,” she turned her head and kissed his palm, holding her lips there before admitting, “I'm just I'm afraid of... losing myself." 

The words that came out of her mouth frighten her. But she had to tell. Their eyes now held the conversation. His, loving and unwavering. Soothing her. She, receiving of his reassurance. She let out a breath. 

"I want you to be ok, Scully.” He moved himself on the bed, both lying, facing one another as he wrapped her up in his embrace. “And if you ever get overwhelmed, or need time, just tell me. And I’ll be here,” she smiled, kissed her, “waiting for you. Loving you enough for both of us.” 

He tenderly kissed her forehead and nuzzled into her. And she let him. Let him love her.


End file.
